John Whittingdale suggested the government should appoint all but two or three directors to a new BBC board.
Photograph: Jonathan Brady/PA

More than 140,000 people have signed a petition calling on the culture secretary, John Whittingdale, to protect the independence of the BBC, as the government faces a backlash in the Lords against its plans for the corporation.

The petition was set up on Monday by campaign group 38 Degrees following comments from Whittingdale suggesting the government should appoint all but two or three directors to a new BBC board expected to be established when the corporation’s Royal Charter is renewed next January.

Whittingdale’s comments have raised concerns about the BBC’s independence because the board, which would replace the BBC Trust, would be involved in setting the corporation’s editorial strategy.

Media campaigns manager at 38 Degrees, Adam McNicholas, said: “This huge petition shows that John Whittingdale’s proposal to undermine the independence of the BBC is going down like a lead balloon with the public.

“In the last few days, over 140,000 people have signed an emergency petition to protect the BBC’s independence. The government will face a huge backlash from the public on the BBC – unless it changes course and bins its plan to hand-pick the people who run the BBC.”

John Whittingdale must allow the BBC board to be truly independent

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The Telegraph reported on Friday that the Liberal Democrat peer, Anthony Lester, is to submit a private members bill calling for the BBC’s independence to be enshrined in law on 18 May, the day of the Queen’s Speech.

Lord Lester told the Guardian there was broad cross-party support for providing a legislative underpinning to the Royal charter. This would protect not only the BBC’s independence but also its funding from deals such as the one struck last year between its director general, Tony Hall, and the government that saw the corporation take on the cost of providing free licence fees to the over-75s. It would also hold the culture secretary of the day to duties that could be enforced in court if necessary.

Lester said: “The members of the new BBC board which [Whittingdale] wants in place of the BBC trust should be independent members [and] not become political placemen and placewomen. Therefore there should be a proper process by which they are appointed.

“Everybody agrees in principle in protecting the BBC’s independence, but no one has said how that is to be done.”

Whittingdale has previously criticised 38 Degrees after the group helped direct 177,000 responses to the Department for Culture, Media and Sport’s consultation on the new BBC Charter. He said in January: “38 Degrees has boasted of its success in generating all those responses. That does not mean they are not valid expressions of opinion; it just means that perhaps they are not wholly representative of public opinion at large.”